Tag: ayumi hamasaki

Ayumi Hamasaki

Known as the Empress of J-Pop in certain circles, Ayumi Hamasaki is almost certainly the most successful female j-pop artist to date. She’s been outsold on an album-by-album basis, but in terms of consistent success there’s nobody that can hold a candle to her right now. She was actually the first artist in Japan to have an album debut at number-one for 11 consecutive years!

It’s a mystery really. She can’t sing that well, in fact her voice is kinda bad. She can’t dance that well. In spite of lots of plastic surgery, she’s not that pretty. She doesn’t look very friendly or down to earth, in fact I’ve heard rumors of her being a bit of a diva. So why is she so successful? Search me. I’m not a fan, though I respect her accomplishments.

Born in 1978, Hamasaki spent several months running around Shibuya doing goodness knows what before being discovered in a nightclub by famous producer Max Matsuura, and the rest, as they say, is history.

In spite of her massive success, she does nothing for me personally. I have no Hamasaki songs in either my album or mp3 collection. Nevertheless there are two songs she has that I kinda liked, Seasons and Dearest, which was used as the ending song for Inuyasha (where most western fans first found out about her). Apart from those…meh. Next!

Some stuff about youtube and Japanese videos

You remember that LOOONG list of youtube links I posted a while ago? I did eventually download all of them, and kept them on my hard drive planning to watch them “some day.” That day turned out to be yesterday and I started working my way through them but… why do I have so many Gackt videos!? He’s so annoying. They’re interviewing him and he’s got his sunglasses on and his chin in his hand like, I dun wanna be here. They ask him a question and he can barely open his mouth to answer, “mutter mutter mutter irrelevant comment mutter mutter.” Get off my screen already.

Then I watched a skit with Ayumi Hamasaki riding bicycles (these are all Hey! Hey! Hey! clips, btw). That girl has the worst screech in the history of the universe. My ears were bleeding, man. And she looks funny, and she can’t sing. I think the story behind her popularity is more the idea of “There’s hope for us all” rather than any real talent. That, and marketing. Oh yeah, then I watched an interview with Amuro Namie, talking about the ways in which she’s a complete bitch to her manager and she’s like “yeah, we totally don’t get along.” Hey, at least you’re honest, right?

Sorry, hating on “tarento” is a hobby of mine. “Artistes” and “talents” like that exist in every country, probably, but it’s only in Japan that they’re shoved relentlessly down your throat everywhere you turn. It makes it all too easy to get sick of them. My favourites are the ones you don’t see every single week on every channel, shilling every single product under the sun.

Watching the clips really helps in a way that radio programs can’t manage, because the visuals and the subtitles keep you focused on the screen, instead of trying to type up an e-mail and open up two documents at the same time as you’re listening to some boring presenter drone on about environmental problems in Japan. I’m making it a daily habit from now on to watch at least 10 clips every day till I work my way through every video on the list. Wish me luck!